I
thought I’d written all I would on the Mac-clone company Psystar, but
I’m back for a little more. While my inner geek thought that what the
company had going was interesting, I’m now almost certain that, hoax or
not (and I still have no reason to believe that Psystar is a hoax),
Psystar will sink without a trace over the next few weeks.

I’ve given Psystar the benefit of the doubt and cut the company a lot of slack, but I’m now in agreement with Larry Dignanthat,
at best, the company is run by amateurs. And amateurs that have made
some pretty major mistakes at that. You can’t change the address of
your company four times in the matter of a few hours without attracting
some level of negative attention. You can’t bad-mouth your credit card
payment processor and say that it couldn’t handle the volume of
transactions when that is a lie. Then switching to PayPal only to have that rug yanked from under them
just underlines the clumsy, Clouseauesque way the business is being
run. You also can’t dodge simple questions, such as those posed by
Brian Caulfield writing for Forbes, without seeming a little suspicious:

Still, Pedraza is short on the sorts of details most
startups won’t shut up about. He won’t go on the record about his
educational background, detail his professional history or name any
previous ventures. The company’s Open Computer is based on a machine
put together by his brother (whom he won’t name), he says.

Bottom line, I think that Psystar is going to have a hard time
finding a payment processor willing to handle transactions for the Open
Computer....

...Given a reasonable 7 to 14 days turnaround for the Mac clones,
customers who managed to order systems before Psystar’s credit card
processing facility was withdrawn should be seeing their systems
delivered next week or the week after. Then we’ll at least know that
Psystar is real. But I don’t see even glowing reviews being able to
save Psystar now. [For the full story click here]

-----------------------------

So what is the lesson learned from this disastrous PR outing? Be ready for those tough questions. If you don't want to talk about your background then don't be a spokesperson for the company. If your company doesn't have the corporate credibility bring in someone who does and make sure he/she can handle tough media questions. Controversy is not a bad PR strategy, just have good answers to back up what you are doing. This is a typical case of arrogance overcoming strategy.

Be ready to launch... have a media trainer run through the tough questions and strategize the answers, have the best spokesperson be the front person. Make sure your points of credibility are in place (Strong management team, product with a clear ROI, Marquee partners, brand recognized customers or endorsers, and a strong industry trend to leverage) and if not have an answer for the alternatives.

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